The Returning 1: Like Day Follows Night
by scribblemyname
Summary: He would perch outside her bedroom window at night, watching her sleep. Kyro drabbles
1. First Day

THE RETURNING STORY ARC

STORY SUMMARY: Past collides with the future when old enemies and allies are brought back together in a devastating telepathic war. For Shadowcat, Rogue, Gambit, and Pyro, it will fundamentally alter everything they know.

DISCLAIMERS: All characters and organizations (with the exception of small, mostly unnamed minor characters) throughout the series are the product of Marvel.

CANONICAL NOTES: This story arc accepts X1, X2, and X3 as canon for characters and events. XO (_Origins_) is ignored.

LANGUAGE AND ACCENTS: Cajun French is courtesy of Heavenmetal (many thanks). French is courtesy of Disdainfully Arrogant and Marmottin (many thanks). I will not reproduce accents in this story arc. Imagine them in.

* * *

**Like Day Follows Night**

**- 2 -**

**Story Summary:** All they gained and lost. Kyro

**Canonical Notes:** Set before and during X1 through a little after X2.

**Acknowledgements: **Thank you to all the original reviewers for this fic when it was still one chapter and called "Night After Night."

**Author's Note: **This is an extension of "Night After Night," which seemed so lonely after all these drabble series. :grins:

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**First Day**

She made him feel weak. Katherine "Kitty" Pryde, girl-next-door brainiac that _should_ have been shy and wasn't, was the first person to make fire look like a paltry plaything.

It was St. John and Kitty's first round in the Danger Room ever, and she was winning.

He hated the feeling blossoming inside him, even if her eyes were kind. Or maybe that is what he hated most.

She stood, one hand in his gut, her whole body in the middle of his living flames. He could bend the fire to his will, but he could not make it burn her.


	2. First Night

**First Night**

She _was_ shy.

He found her in the kitchen with a plate full of cookies and a jug of milk. Insomnia? Nightmare? All he knew was those brown eyes went wide and her cheeks flushed a mild pink, and she ducked her head and fixed her gaze intently on chocolate chip.

He hid his surprise under a smug smirk. "Cat got your tongue, Kitten?"

She snorted. "It's Kitty."

Both eyebrows up. He helped himself to a glass of milk while she pretended he wasn't so close. "John," he offered.

She looked up and smiled.

He drained the glass. "Thanks, Kitten."


	3. Burn Me Once

**Burn Me Once**

They didn't actually know each other, so it should've been easy to ignore him.

It wasn't.

St. John Allerdyce was _not_ easy to ignore.

He was bad boy behind her, flirting, teasing, _annoying_. How he ever made friends with good boy Bobby Drake was beyond her. He'd set flames to dancing to see if she'd phase through them (she wouldn't), then call her Kitten to see if she would correct him (she would).

But the absolute worst was how a student with failing grades (him) could thoroughly trounce an honor student (her) in English and English lit.

Every. Single. Time.


	4. Burn Me Twice

**Burn Me Twice**

"You know it's not that hard," he said with a smirk.

That smirk bothered Kitty down to the bottom of her well-behaved soul. "I am _not_ going to skip class, _John_." She spat this last, cheeks flushing in anger.

He laughed, leaned into her personal space, forcing her to take a step back. "Thinking on the name Pyro. What do you think?"

He was asking _her_ about his _codename_? She stared in disbelief. "How about annoying?"

"Nah." He clicked his lighter open and shut in that irritating way of his. "No pizzazz. Yeah. I like Pyro." He nodded, satisfied.

"Whatever."


	5. Don't Play Fair

**Don't Play Fair**

He didn't like how she was so smart, always had to be right. She took personal insult if she wasn't at the top of every class she was in.

He didn't like how she scrunched her nose when she disagreed with him, how she tapped her pencil when she did her homework (_and she complained about his lighter_), or how she chewed on her lower lip when she tried to think.

He didn't like how cool and collected she was, how she blew him off like so very underwhelming. He was more into fire, _heat_. Pyro, right?

Except, he did.


	6. Don't Play Nice

**Don't Play Nice**

He teased her endlessly about her name (at least she deigned to speak to him), but that all came to a startling halt when Cyclops rattled off their new codenames in the Danger Room.

Sprite. Kitty had chosen _Sprite_.

"And I always thought sprites were easy," he quipped with a smirk.

She wasn't. Not even close.

He had a new weapon in his growing arsenal. The way he said her codename made her cheeks flush with flaming color, whether from embarrassment or anger he didn't care. She noticed. She _reacted_. To him.

Besides, he just liked to see her blush.


	7. First Dark

**First Dark**

She didn't take the news well. Kitty's parents had brought her up the model daughter, student, Jew. Naturally, they didn't expect her to make a scene when they told her about the divorce. A few screams, broken furnishings, and an hour later, they were thoroughly disabused of _that_ notion.

Now, she was sprawled, sobbing at the bottom of her favorite tree behind the mansion.

"Sprite?" The ball of fire and the weary voice could only be John's.

She finally managed, "My parents."

And maybe it should've seemed odd to her that look of _understanding_ in his eyes. But it didn't.


	8. First Light

**First Light**

Kitty curled up into a little ball. St. John wrapped one arm around her shoulders. It wasn't crude or sexual in any way, just the comfort of another person's warmth.

"Your parents split?" she asked, amazed at herself for even daring.

"Long time ago, Kitten." His breath was warm on her cheek.

She leaned her head against his shoulder. She shivered. She had never liked the dark, and it was cold outside. "Could you make the light again?" she asked softly.

She wondered if he'd heard her, but then he held out his palm and the world lit in flames.


	9. Cross My Heart

**Cross My Heart**

The first time she hauled him through a few classroom walls on break, he swore a blue streak that would make a sailor blush.

She giggled—genuine, one hundred percent, girlish giggle—and pulled him along behind her, not stopping until they reached the two trees she'd been crying her eyes out at last night. "You climb trees?"

St. John stared at her. She _had_ to be kidding him, right?

But no. Kitty had already scrambled up into one tree and was clambering from there into the other.

"C'mon up, you big baby," she taunted.

"You're nuts." But he came.


	10. Hope to Die

**Hope to Die**

It seemed the tables had turned—_again_, fire inside her and she _wouldn't burn_—'cause now it was Kitty that owned the battle.

She liked to phase him. Shock him out of his wits when his hand went through the chair, when he couldn't touch her, when she whacked him with a book, a pencil, _something_, and he would rather it hit him than that tingly, scary rush of a world that wasn't real.

"Stay solid," he griped.

"But you're cute when you're all surprised." She waved one hand inside him.

He guessed it made those flutters in his heart.


	11. Play for Stakes

**Play For Stakes**

Kitty and John weren't an item. At best they were friends; at worst, friendly enemies: the kind you loved to hate. There was no them, and there was absolutely no reason why she should stare viciously at flames turned into apples and no reason to be so furious with a girl that was more taken with Bobby in the first place.

And who couldn't touch.

No reason at all to be jealous. No reason at all to wish the new girl hadn't come. _No reason at all_.

But then why did her heart twist and say, that's _my_ St. John?


	12. Play for Strife

**Play For Strife**

Kitty tried to hate her. She tried to belittle her when showing her around, to dismiss her mutation and her feelings, to order the girl to back off by using her attitude. Kitty would have rolled her eyes—what attitude?—but she was too shocked by her own behavior.

What kind of a person _was_ she?

And it was just too much work to analyze it, to admit to herself what this really was—Kitty was _not_ jealous—or admit that she ought to _befriend_ Rogue.

She crossed her arms and glared in the mirror. It was all _his_ fault.


	13. Swear Off You

**Swear Off You**

It had sneaked up on him when he wasn't looking for it. St. John Allerdyce didn't make attachments, gave the finger to authority, didn't care about what little goodie girls like Kitty Pryde thought of him or anything else.

So when had _that_ changed?

He flicked his lighter open to play with the flames, pondering his dilemma. He saw the sting in her chocolate eyes when he flirted with the new girl, Rogue. He felt the sting himself when she slammed her door in his face that night.

Everything he cared about _always_ ended up burnt.

His lighter clicked shut.


	14. Swear My Life

**Swear My Life**

Her shoulders were hunched against him. He watched her from the seat behind, clicking his lighter, watching her jaw clench from annoyance at the sound.

Miss Munroe asked for their papers and he flicked the lighter shut before handing his homework forward.

Kitty didn't look at him when she took it—or when the small slip of paper he'd passed her beneath it fell into her lap.

She frowned at it and read, then sucked in her breath.

He was beginning to get nervous, and he opened the lighter again.

She turned to him and smiled.

He forgot to breathe.


	15. First Truth

**First Truth**

She didn't even know he wrote poetry, let alone _romantic _poetry.

__

"When the fires of love ignited and burned,  
When I realized all I'd ever learned  
Could not compare to the wings in me  
When your hand touched mine and set me free...

"Then I chose my path anew—  
I'd do it all again for you.  
I want to run from this spell you weave,  
But I've forgotten how to leave."

"Did you mean this?" she asked later, ignoring their compromising position with her sitting in his lap.

But he met her gaze so openly, she believed him. "You think?"


	16. First Lie

**First Lie**

He tried to tell himself this didn't matter; no one would get hurt; Kitty knew exactly what she was getting into. He did not want to admit to himself, staring into flames—_something always had to burn_—Kitty had absolutely no idea what.

St. John flicked the lighter shut, dropped his head into his hands, and groaned. She was just so _innocent_. A guy like him had no business being around a girl like her.

But he wanted to be. And she wanted him to be.

So he told himself that was enough. He told himself it would be okay.


	17. Dark in Flames

**Dark in Flames**

John liked to sit back and watch her with their friends. Kitty was just so _alive_, and he was always off to the side, scoffing at the idea of innocence.

Rogue would settle in beside him sometimes. "They don't make sense, do they?" she asked quietly.

He stared at her. "What?"

An indistinct gesture with a gloved hand toward Kitty laughing at one of Bobby's jokes. "Them. Maybe getting close enough, some of that joy'll rub off on me, ya know?" Rogue turned a dark gaze on his.

John flicked open his lighter, stared into the flames. He did know.


	18. Dark in Sight

**Dark in Sight**

Kitty didn't know where the storm clouds were coming from, but she could feel them brewing and see them in St. John's burning eyes.

She spent more time with him than ever, if just to stave off this gnawing worry in her heart. He still laughed for her, smiled at her, held her tighter than he had before, but there was a desperation in their touch that hadn't used to be there.

Kitty asked him once, "What would make you happy?"

His answer came easily. "You: safe, taken care of, forever."

And she wondered why that wasn't the right answer.


	19. All to Lose

**All to Lose**

He was scaring her. He hadn't given away their relationship, but he was coming awfully close. He was buying her _flowers_ and _books_. Their four-way hangouts were rapidly becoming double dates. He watched her so intently, she felt her skin was fire, and he was making her burn.

"Summers thinks I'm corrupting you."

"Bull." Kitty glared. "Since when have _you_ cared what Scott thinks?"

His lighter clicked open.

"What?" she demanded.

"Nothing." Tone light. "I just never hear you cuss."

Kitty reached out gently to touch his hand. The lighter snapped shut.

"I never want to lose you," she whispered.


	20. All to Gain

**All to Gain**

He hated that he couldn't protect her—couldn't find her, couldn't wrap her in his arms and ensconce her safely at the Drakes. Without her, he found himself floundering, giving in to dark impulses that would only make him enemies.

Then he met Magneto.

Charming and powerful, _still_ friends with the professor, St. John's mind calculated away to the tune of his lighter. Nothing to lose—_still_ friends; all to gain—she would be _safe_ from any enemy he ever made. And he would make them. He always did.

"What's your real name?" Magneto asked.

And John was ready.

"Pyro."


	21. Hope is Frail

**Hope is Frail  
**

He didn't really believe Kitty would understand. She was so d— hopeful, always believing the best of a man like St. John Allerdyce, never realizing fire meant destruction, and it was hiding underneath. Even so, he hoped she would know he never meant to hurt her.

He slipped his lighter into Rogue's gloved hands and caught her curious tilt of the head, lips parting uncertainly, as if to voice the question.

"Just give that to her," he told her bluntly, not bothering to make it a request.

Rogue understood. She had her own dark side. She nodded.

He walked away. 


	22. Hope is Pain

**Hope is Pain  
**

Kitty stared at the lighter, turned it over in her hand. "This means he's coming back, right?"

John would never be separated from his precious lighter for long. It represented his power, his mastery, his control—something he desperately maintained, driven by the childhood memories that haunted him. It gave Kitty a swell of hope. This _couldn't_ be goodbye.

But Rogue just gave her that sympathetic look despised by the bereft everywhere.

"He's coming back," Kitty whispered, fiercely clinging to that agonizing hope. She cradled the lighter against her. He had to come back. He had to.

He was _hers._


	23. Day After Day

**Day After Day  
**

She would perch on the inside of his window sill for hours, trying to see the world through his eyes. She would head to the kitchen for milk, then abort mission when she remembered he teased her mercilessly for the habit. She climbed up into their trees, curled into a ball, and cried.

She hated this. She was just Kitty now, not Kitten. She was the third wheel with their friends instead of the double date. She was alone.

"Kitty?" Rogue called up the tree hesitantly.

Kitty just curled up tighter, as if it could make her heart stop hurting. 


	24. Night After Night

**A/N:** And done! Sorry it ends so sadly, but... It was foregone that it would.

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**Night After Night  
**

He would perch outside her bedroom window at night, watching her sleep.

The thick blankets rose and fell over her tiny body. She stirred, stretched a little, affording him a nice view.

He leaned forward involuntarily. He wanted to steal her breath away with hot, passionate kisses like she had done to him so long ago. Instead, he would stare at his Zippo lighter clutched in her small fist where he had left it almost a year ago.

He shuddered, knowing how much he had given away.

Finally, Pyro would sigh and turn away from his Kitten.

Night after night. 


End file.
